The next step is to request this file from the server. Then, for simplicity, save the URL of the file in a variable. The first thing we need to do is to import ‘requests’. So, here are the steps to downloading a file using Python 'requests' package If you think about it for a bit, you may realize that connecting to a webpage on the web is practically the same as downloading its contents.īy the same logic, if there is a file we wish to download, we can make a GET request to it, catch the response and then export that response to a local file on our machine… Which is practically downloading the file.įor the purposes of this example, we can use this Wikipedia image as the file we’d like to obtain. Now that we've briefed you about Python 'requests' package, let’s go ahead and examine a rather naïve approach to downloading files. It is one of the most popular Python packages for this purpose. Instead, you can use the simple interface of the ‘requests’ module. That is to say that you as a user, don’t need to know exactly how HTTP requests work. It is a user-friendly implementation of the HTTP request abstract concept.
#Python download webpage how to#
In this tutorial, we will discuss one of these methods – we will show you how to programmatically download files from the web with the help of the Python ‘ requests’ library.īut let’s begin with a couple of words about the ‘requests’ package. Lucky for data science professionals, there are many ways to obtain useful data – through a company’s internal data collection mechanisms, by taking advantage of APIs or just by downloading a relevant file from the web. Data collection is an integral step of every company’s data analysis pipeline.